KATHMANDU, DECEMBER 6
As the runway maintenance schedule at Tribhuvan International Airport has been delayed, the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal has decided to postpone the compulsory rule for international airlines to shift some of their operations to Gautam Buddha International Airport in Bhairahawa to March 25.
Because the maintenance of TIA runway which was expected to commence on December 16 has been pushed back, the CAAN has reviewed the winter schedule of mandating international airlines conducting more than three flights a day to allocate a flight from GBIA from the same date, said Gyanendra Bhul, information officer at CAAN.
"We had planned to start the runway rehabilitation work at TIA from December 16 and had prepared the winter schedule accordingly," Bhul told THT.
According to him, as per the initial plan, TIA will be closed between 10:00pm and 8:00am for maintenance. Because of this, and also for effective utilisation of GBIA, CAAN had asked international airlines to shift some of their flights to GBIA, just as it was done for the Nepali airlines serving international destinations from October 30.
Due to the new rule, an aircraft of Nepal Airlines Corporation leaving for New Delhi from TIA was denied take-off by airport authorities on October 30, leaving 254 passengers stranded.
With the postponement of runway maintenance at TIA, CAAN has also revoked its earlier decision to cut NAC's Kathmandu-Delhi flights, as per Bhul "This means the NAC will operate 14 flights from TIA to Delhi from December 19.
The flights on Kathmandu-Kuala Lumpur and Kathmandu-Dubai routes, which were reduced to five, will now be revised up to seven flights per week."
Earlier, the NAC had announced that it would be conducting flights on the Kathmandu-Doha-Bhairahawa-Kathmandu route and Kathmandu-Kuala Lumpur-Bhairahawa-Kathmandu route.
Apart from Kuwaiti air carrier Jazeera Airways, no other airline had really shown any inclination to operate from GBIA citing non-viability of business at the national pride project.
Himalaya Airlines, however, has been operating charter flights from GBIA to Malaysia since November 3.
A version of this article appears in the print on December 6, 2022, of The Himalayan Times.
